“Greg can probably cover our cabin too. He still owes me for the laptop I gave him in high school.”
That part wasn’t even true.
He’d given me an old broken Dell senior year because he was getting a brand-new MacBook.
Even then, he made me “borrow” it like he was doing me a favor.
Still, no one corrected him.
Not Mom.
Not Dad.
Not my sister Katie, who chimed in right after:
“Haha, yes. Carter’s birthday is basically a holiday. Let’s make it big.”
I didn’t respond.
I left the group chat that afternoon.
A few hours later, my mom called.
I let it go to voicemail.
Then she texted:
“Can’t believe you left the family chat. That’s immature, Greg.”
I typed and deleted at least four responses before I settled on one word.
“Noted.”
Her reply was immediate.
“What’s your problem lately? This is about the Christmas thing, isn’t it?”
“You always overreact.”
I didn’t respond.
I was done explaining things to people who refused to listen.
But I didn’t realize how deep the favoritism went until a week later when Emma came home from school holding a folder of class assignments.
She was excited.
Smiling.
Finally getting her energy back.
“Guess what?” she said, holding out the folder.
“I got picked for the school STEM fair.”
I grinned.
“That’s awesome, M. What are you going to build?”
“A solar-powered oven,” she said. “My teacher said it was a smart idea.”
Melissa and I hyped her up all evening.
We ordered materials online, printed diagrams, started drawing up presentation boards.
That weekend, I posted a photo of her sketching ideas on the dining table.
Just a quiet dad moment.
Nothing showy.
The caption said:
“Proud of my little engineer.”
A day later, my sister Katie posted a picture of Carter holding a basketball.
Katie’s caption:
“My nephew equals next NBA MVP. Sorry, not sorry.”
Then Mom commented under her post:
“Genius boy. We’re so proud of you, Carter.”
Under mine?
Silence.
Melissa noticed first.
“They didn’t even like the post.”
I shrugged.
“It’s fine.”
But it wasn’t.
Because two days later, Emma came to me looking confused.
“Grandma posted a picture of Carter on Facebook and said he was the smartest grandkid,” she said.
I froze.
“When did she post that?”
“This morning,” Emma said quietly.
“He won something at school. A spelling thing.”
She wasn’t crying, but her face had that hollow look I’d seen at Christmas.
That quiet, defeated confusion kids have when something’s too big to understand.
I pulled her close.
“Hey,” I said. “You’re amazing, okay? And we’re proud of you always.”
She nodded into my chest, but I could feel her body tense.
The next day, I called my mom.
She answered with that tone she always used when she thought I had something to apologize for.
“Well, look who finally decided to call.”
“Did you really post that Carter is your smartest grandkid?” I asked.
My voice was calm.
But I wasn’t.
“Oh, come on, Greg. It’s just a figure of speech. You’re really taking things too personally these days.”
“You know Emma saw that, right?”
“She’s a child. She’ll get over it.”
That was the moment something inside me shifted.
“No,” I said quietly. “She shouldn’t have to get over it.”
There was a pause.
Then Mom said, “Greg, you’re blowing this way out of proportion. You always have to be the victim.”
“No,” I said. “I’ve just stopped pretending it doesn’t hurt.”
Another pause.
Then she said something I carried with me for the rest of the year.
“Well, maybe if you raised your kids to stand out more, they’d get the attention you want so badly.”
I didn’t yell.
I didn’t argue.
I just hung up.
Melissa was in the doorway.
She’d heard the whole thing.
She walked over, sat beside me, and whispered:
“We’re done with them, right?”
I nodded.
But of course it wasn’t over.
Two weeks later, in February, I got a letter in the mail from my parents.
Not a card.
Not an apology.
A letter.
It was written in my dad’s handwriting.
Neat.
Cold.
“Greg, we’re disappointed in how you’ve handled things lately. Cutting ties over perceived slights is childish. We hope you’ll reconsider your attitude and remember that family means putting pride aside.”
At the bottom, my mom had scribbled:
“Tell Emma and Lucas we love them, even if they don’t always earn it.”
I didn’t show the letter to the kids.
I didn’t want them to see that poison in writing.
But I did show it to Melissa.
She read it once.
Then again.
Then put it down and said nothing for a long time.
That night, she said:
“You know what the worst part is?”
“What?”
“They think they’re the victims.”
I laughed bitterly.
They always had.
Even then, I thought we’d hit the bottom.
I thought that letter was the worst it would get.
I didn’t know yet what Ryan had been up to behind the scenes.
I didn’t know what my parents were planning for Easter.
I didn’t know how far they were willing to go to pretend they’d done nothing wrong.
I didn’t know how deep they’d dig that hole before trying to drag me down into it.
Because the betrayal that broke everything hadn’t happened yet.
But it was coming.
And when it did, there’d be no going back.
The fallout from that letter hung over our house like thick fog.
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